The Peoples Democratic Party has demanded the immediate sack of the Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi, and the suspended managing director of the Nigerian Ports Authority, Hadiza Usman, over the alleged looting of N165bn in NPA.
The National Publicity Secretary of PDP, Kola Ologbondiyan, in a statement on Tuesday, also charged the minister to come clean on the alleged involvement of his wife, Edith, in the N48bn contract scam rocking the Niger Delta Development Commission.
According to Ologbondiyan, it is unpardonable that the humongous sum in the NDDC contract scam involving the wife of the transport minister was allegedly siphoned in the guise of offering training to unsuspecting youths in the area.
“That it took the minister six years (2016 to 2021) to query the suspended NPA MD over the alleged looting of N165bn unremitted operating surplus of the agency, which is under his purview, is suspect and raises public belief that he only acted apparently to shield himself after indicting audit documents had already been exposed.
“This is in addition to reports from the office of auditor-general, which also unearthed the looting of unremitted deduction to Federal Inland Revenue Service amounting to N3,667,750,470. $148,845,745.04, €4,891,449.50 and £252,682.14 under Usman and Amaechi’s ministerial supervision,” he stated.
The party also accused the embattled Usman of siphoning over N15bn through a Corporate Social Responsibility project.
“The audit report also exposed another N15.18bn allegedly siphoned through shady CSR projects by the NPA, an agency under Amaechi’s ministerial purview,” it claimed.
“The PDP, therefore, rejects the obvious attempt at a cover-up in the recourse to an administrative panel of enquiry pppecommended by the minister to investigate the NPA fraud, in which he also has some questions to answer.
“Our party insists that both the minister and the indicted NPA MD should be handed over to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission for investigation and possible prosecution.
“Moreover, Nigerians are appalled that fingers of fraud allegation are also pointing to the wife of the minister in a N48bn contract scam under the sacked NDDC MD, Nelson Bambraifa, who was reportedly nominated into that position by the minister, but fired on allegations of corruption,” he said.
